Premiere: To live on

It feels like I’m going to die. Everytime.
The heart is pounding, can’t breathe, just has to get away.
Just because I see a man in a police uniform.
Breathe in, breathe out.
It is not dangerous. There you go.
It’ goes well’s okay
Do you remember that you were the one who taught me to breathe like this?

In the monologue performance Å LEVE VIDERE, we meet the sister who was on Utøya with her brother. She was 15 years old, he was 21 years old. The brother never came home again. She talks about the 12 years without her brother and tries to live on with the loss, sadness and fear that characterizes everyday life at home in Northern Norway. In the rage after the horrific incident, she decides never to engage in politics again.

At the same time, she is a witness to a society where politics is becoming more and more polarized, and that the perpetrator’s extreme attitudes are gaining ground in more and more people. In Norway, we promised each other to “never be silent, never forget”, but the important debate that was to take place after 22 July stagnated. In her fictional conversations with her brother, she makes a settlement that leads her to something unexpected.

Rimfrost productions presents the monologue Å LEVE VIDERE for a youth audience. The performance is written and directed by Nina Wester based on conversations with a family who lost one of their own on Utøya. The monologue reflects experiences after the terror attack on 22 July, focusing on the part of the attack that took place on Utøya.

I go through what happened again and again because that
my brain has to find a way it can understand.
Why did it happen? How is it possible?
And why was it so quiet afterwards when we promised each other we never would
stop yelling?

Å LEVE VIDERE premieres during Showbox 2023 at Kloden Teater in Oslo.